If you see me
tell me to take your hand,
to stop the fall, to finally land,
before I reach the bottom of a black-bearded abyss.
Don't miss,
oh, and maybe one more kiss
before I see me
pulling everything away.

My eyes couldn't pound
through the seductive sound
the click
tick
stick
of the lock.
You saw me
your fingers tucked
deep in the pockets of your silence.

If I could love
the limping
ugly
afraid
part of me
That I drag through the mud
and thorns

If I could let
the transparent
clawing
screaming
silhouette speak
Instead of kicking it
into the basement

If I could put
my deepest human essence
onto paper
for everyone to see

Then.
Then, I could be free.

Sinking
To a familiar imprint in the sand
Salt traffic jams
Shark teeth and flared nostrils
Fingers numb
Curled around the trigger
Cannot let go.

But through the noise
Ripples
Quadratic equations
I see a blurred sunset
It feels like the day we first met.

She knew
It would be good
as she stood
under a sky more colorful than blue.
As she stood
on a threshold of something
that smelled like the silk and satin
he had slept on just the night before,
She hoped for more
than red lights flashing,
than hearts surrounded by fences.
But, she only heard the mashing
of sweetened heartstrings not fully cooked.
If only she had looked
for something more than a cookbook.

Why not engineer all the mistakes away?
We could evolve into machines.
Then there wouldn't be cells
To proliferate
Uncontrollably.
There wouldn't be thoughts
Only wires.
I wouldn't end up at your door.
I wouldn't care
About the valleys,
Mountain ranges,
That your white cotton shirt stretches over.
We could be ones and zeroes-
A code for no heartbreak.

Your introduction:
a cow carcass in the fridge
Your destruction:
a black burned bridge
Your construction:
a fake, plastic heart for mom
and a bomb
into already destroyed lives.
There is no apology
or technology
that can fix this war zone.

I grasp needle and thread
Read somewhere
That's what I'm suppose to do
Clues to how to swallow this
Kiss well:
Sell your soul piece-by-piece
Crease like rayon
Crayon melting in the backseat
Fragility is my greatest strength.

Velvet wrapping paper
Over something he
Or she
Or them
Could
Or would
Or should
Never love.
Two hands and a brush
Cracked lips and ****** teeth.
One stitch at a time.

Red light blinking
Hopelessly thinking
This may never turn green
Of all his sayings mean,
Which did I love the most?
Sarcastically boast
I can't pick just one.
I set them free
Like helium balloons
I stare at the sun until I can't see
What it was you wanted me to be.

This pencil sounds
like sputtering,
a car engine failing.
It smells like
the sheets you just left.
It feels weighted,
heavy like a lead blade
that I can hardly hold up.
It tastes bittersweet,
like the tail-end of smoke:
as musky and infectious
as your kiss.
This pencil looks
at me sparkling with dew,
"did you lose interest in me
like the boys lose interest in you?"

I am just a rat,
some object all the boys pick and kick and lick at,
tease, and put in a cage,
saw in half, and sew back together
with their **** and *******--
their sweet nothings
their bitter sentences.
They're lies,
blades,
dark, heroic, and valiant seas that drown rats.
They're litter all over consciousness.

They all say,
I want to get to know you
I want to be your friend
I want your trust
but you must
give it all to me by this time
this date
the date
that one date
ate all hope I could really stomach

They all say
I want to get to know you
I want to prove to me
through you
my worth.
Between you and gullible, there is no dearth.

They all say
Come to my apartment
***...

...

...

...

It is okay if you give up.

Lavender and metal
Will settle
Whatever is broken in me
I want to be
As stoic as a a cherry tree.
Take enough pills
To block out all the madness thrills.

But that was last paragraph
Accepting blades with a laugh
Lavender and metal
Sharpened to a fine gin edge
Throw out who you are, that's the pledge
I can never utter
Because of the shutter
She causes.

I lost count of the loses.

Brown-eyed eraser
Subtract scars, blurry
Hurry up, you gotta chase her
Stand straight over the river bluff
Reach a toe to touch
A cloud, a puff
Of smoke from dragons underneath
A sword unsheathed
I'll tell you if I'll let me
Count it down
One, two, three

Tragic toes split down the line
Fine tipped pens spit out the last time
I saw you sail by
Just pass through
Two hundred years of agony
In a single breath of air
Without the exhale
I search my scratches for one that might
remember your palm print
I loved you but didn't

She met him in high school
there was a motorcycle
her pink shirt
Thirty
some-odd years
He has a divorce and a half
She has a tumor and a laugh
indicative of decline.
Three kids on the line
What's the price of a tickle to his parts?
Five hearts.

Imagine how salt and water
hydrogen and oxygen
ball and stick models
all the real things
create the intangible
obese sadness crowding out
skinny gems of budding joy
the moment I try to shed my skin
eyes cloudy
I can't see
straight anymore.

Look at him and go out on a limb,
Or am I suppose to use a three by five?
Slop on the mascara,
Know the difference between "por" and "para".
Go to this school, so they can feel secure;
Be clean, be pure.
Starve- you can't be fat.
Fail because you didn't follow format.
"I don't care how well you draw,
Just go to Harvard and study law."
They'll lay out your life step-by-step,
And yes, you will be every teachers' pet.
I don't care what you do;
Be cut-throat, be cruel,
Anything to be:
This cookie cutter you made for me.

I line the pills up
white and blue:
almost patriotic.
You don't notice
my back against the wall:
a wild wolf call
for fight or flight.
I always pick flight.
Almost patriotic,
what happened to your American bite?
A helicopter hovers
over bleeding covers
and blonde news anchors
say, "its much worse then it is."
Almost patriotic
Almost pathetic
Almost an anesthetic.

Half my head is shaved
The other half is bruised
You're a 2D
Paper cutout
Not yet origami
Looking for folding schemes
You don't know you're lost, it seems.
And I am no dotted-line-edition
It's all just simple addition:
Platitudes only get you thumbnail deep
Half my head is shaved
The other half, you can keep.

I ripped the pearls off my neck.
The string was as fragile as love.
White spheres, dozens,
roll under the couch
like my baggage--
all the stuff you wouldn't,
couldn't,
didn't,
help me carry.
How do you think I got so strong?
Wearing heavy pearls around my neck?
Bearing heavy curls around my wreck
around my sides
inside my insides?
How do you think I got so strong?
Making mistakes and being wrong.

Sticky ribs
A dozen mad libs
That we couldn’t fill in
Saying no to gin
In a ***** martini
Pulling off that bikini
What was all that worth?
Maybe nothing

I wrote a message
carelessly to you,
filling your deficiencies
with notices,
"the power will be shut off."

Maybe a powerless life
has more fire
more matches.

Maybe a powerless life
goes to bed
with the sun
wrapped up in heat
sleeping soundly with solar flares
nestled into places unknown.

Maybe a powerless life
writes more letters,
watches the birds,
and can see me sitting there,
an apparition now uncovered.

There is wood grain
on train track ties
buried under gravel,
broken glass, and goodbyes.
Lovers' footprints
echo on the platform-
A stampede repeating
It all lays silent now,
whistles in the distance.

Faked but believable,
her resolve to cut away
to throw away
to never resuscitate
all the bad parts
all the parts that chose her.
Replace the broken pieces
the useless pieces
with ones you pick out.

High heeled boot
His time, her loot
Thrown onto the tracks.
He cries, she packs.
As she stands on the platform,
confusion becomes the norm.

Smeared black eyeliner
settling into
newborn wrinkles.
I tried to tease.
Just stop, please,
because I can't tell
what's real and what's not.
Imagination constantly carving a spot.
So in some storm,
some torrential desperation,
I remain
warm.

"Drop something?"
The sign asks.
Yes, I dropped the love
you gave me
somewhere along the tracks.  
"Leave it!"
The sign exclaims.
No, I would jump
onto the muddy tracks
if I knew.

Always dropping things just won't do.

Head bowed
Eyes closed
Cellphone
Smart
Phone
Worship

It has all gone vapor
Through the chimney
Mixing with the clouds
Pixel perfect
Engineering effort

learn to look up again
See again
Eyes open

A swell in-throat
Tumbling boat
Bumbling sailor
Not quite awake
Quickly, give him a hard shake.
A swell grows paler
Closer still
Loneliness turns shrill
Awareness bereft
Beating all that is left
Eating all that stands.
Lighthouse growing dark.

Was I beautiful
drowning knee-deep
riding a crest, steep?
Was I beautiful
the lace of my soul
grazing
the button of my mind
gazing?
Am I beautiful
like you still are?
One single gram of one single star.

Tell me once more
Was I beautiful
once before?

I have no ear for disaster
I just master
The art of self destruction
fire-building construction
Production of serotonin
A lacking pain, moanin'
A silence because I can't find the words
fly-away blood like birds
In my bath
Miscalculated math
Who said to climb this steeple?
Made out of a pile of people
On my cracked plate
Oh, you came to save me?
Well, it's far too late.

Torn up like
Mom's wicker baskets
Living forever
Like all their caskets
A sky, blue pastel
An empty castle
Engulfed by vines
They ignore the signs
Thorns tear thicker
The wicker
Of baskets.

Jars on a shelf
Break upon earthquake
Screams through the house
Glass on the floor, douse
The fire I set
On the day we first met
I pull out everything good
Try to save it all
What do you call
A pile of should
Vanished good?
Cross you heart
And hope to die
Please, I beg you,
Stick a needle in my eye.

He was a mid life crisis
Wrapped in black velvet:
A curtained tunnel
Of scarcity
the drive to create it.
I was a placeholder
A magazine while you wait
Your diploma comes in the mail
Marketing copy in Latin.
The only thing you fear
Is the weight of your own sound
Resounding:
An invisible fist
Beating a drum,
The one your rib cage locks away.
Soundless.

I use my pennies to buy experiences
Like your smile
The smell of your skin
Fresh and real
For those I steal
Lie
And cheat
A drug to beat
Another drug
To beat the need for drugs.

I put my hands
Up through the sands
Of the hourglass.
Please pass
The hammer and nail.
My burned heart strings, pale
In comparison to live
Bees in a hive
Never feeling
The sands, nor peeling
Wetlands off brain surfaces.
No, I'll take my heart strings
Put them with all the other things.
Then, I raise my hammer to the glass.
I spill out onto the shining brass.
Cold and blinded I cry,
"This out here is all a lie."

A distorted  lens
makes it hard to find your cast.
Got the bends
from ascending too fast.

I was drowning.
I ran out of air
while watching a flounder frowning.
He looked so sad I had to stare.

Sail away.
Raise the mast
Raise the mask
Praise the flask
All to learn:
Be careful when you go diving.

Spitting out poetry
knitting out seams
seems to never make much sense
or much money.
It tastes like honey
It exists where
landlines turn into moles
landmines turn into souls.
Bowls of coal for breakfast,
flag half mast
cast in bronze on front lawns.
Yawns echo through classrooms.
What was I saying before?
I can't remember anymore.

Glue comes out too fast
But not at the right angle
Adhesion unburdened
Learned it
From living just second-by-second
Was the reason ever reckoned?
I don't remember.
It was in late December
When I opened my eyes
Covered in glue
Still not dry, realizing:
The glue comes out too fast
And never seems to last.

Here is your main problem
You don't smile at people
Your eyes stare wide
Like a deer in the headlights
Don't you see?
No one likes that moment
Right before collision
So close your eyes
And saw off your antlers
While you're at it,
Get out of the road.

Why did you craft
all this sorrow?
How did you scrape
enough clay off the sides of my ribs?
Who are you,
and what did you do with that heart
I gave you?
Did you throw it
away?
Are you keeping it in a mason jar?
Does it get enough sunlight?
Do you feed it?

No.
Because I feel the death of it.
Deep, down low.
Please throw it down into this pit.

I could never be your sunrise
I don't know how to stand
Like the sun above the peaks
I don't know how to take
Darkness away from stars
Your mark doesn't have to scar to show
Below the layers:
Lingering molecules that once touched your skin
Love is patient, but mine is thin
Within a walled-city soul
This torture takes it's toll.

They say the pills have
A long half life
Like nuclear waste.
Carbon.
Dividing and dissolving
Away the sadness
Oh-so tangible
A tangerine of despair.
"Orange is the new black,"
They say

I am a wooden floor
An ant under the table
Black speck
I am a second choice
Place holder
A paint swatch match
Just a little too blue.
I have become a tiger
Fierce teeth bared
Stripes up and down
And I love you
Even as you tell me
I am a wooden floor.

Wall of pillows
Brick embroidery
Carries a simple bloom
Plume of smoke
Through a crack in the cement
City streets salty
With tears and sweat
Wet with ice
Slip, slice
**** and dice
The only games I know how to play
Why can't I ever mean what I say?

Golden light
Silver flight
Above the dark city
Bleeding pretty
Orange traffic streams.
Dreams
being lived below
Being shot slow
Blow
Jobs
Economic growth
A hope!
Cope
With the cancer taking mom away.
"Pay in love,"
I keep repeating
Unheard.
Heart stops beating.
Still the thrill of cheating,
And pleating
Your hair,
Swirls swift in my veins.
Shining and shimmering
In golden light,
The few threads keeping me tied together
Catch his scissor's eye.

The men line up
Up against my brain
Too big for its skull
They bleed out my eyes
And eyelashes become their noose.
But you don't ever get in line.
So you won't be finished off.
Done, you sewed up creature,
Will you keep this name?

Go ahead
Finish me off with your broken
Neck intentions
I see how your eyes flutter and shut
Like a hospital bed curtain
I see the hangmen
Dangling from your
Eyelashes

Slowly fire red
blood dries to a maroon
and, there, a raccoon
mocks your crawling carcass

Ha ha you know the rhyme then
Again and again
I'm looking for someone who can understand
Awkward crisscrossing needle and thread
Your hands are stained red with my blood
Now you are gone
Your absence leaving
Bleeding bullet holes
That anyone can walk
By and put their fingers in
I love the quick high
The exasperated rush but
I wish now you did not leave
Such a perfect exit wound

Needle and thread shaking
But Why? Haven't I done this before?
A thousand times
Change his name.
Sew him up.
Scared every time.

*You changed your name
A thousand times since last we met
I am cold and tired my wounds deep
I love you no-name
Sew me up

Piggy bank smashed
For the last coin and cash
Stash of licorice
Blends in well
Swell with butterflies
When I see her
On my wrist
And in my blood
Flood my veins with fire and flames
Tames animals I don't know the name of
Not a single dove
To love
Above a harrowing landscape
**** my mind
Before my body
Shoddy, I give it away
Don't have to stay
I'll even hold the door for you
Piggy bank black and blue
Do what you need to do

Kids order coffee.
They are extracted and
addicted before they can even see
social media profiles, supply and demand.

Kids use hair gel,
mascara; they know how to type
"You're nothing without a thick shell"
Facebook. iPhone. Google. Skype.

A joyous blame game
Getting them to raise themselves
and each other.
Where, oh where, is mother?

Didn't know they could?
Welcome to the era without
Childhood.

Play it tough
Skin on skin
So soft
It hurts. ***** of a pin
Feel alive again

Start simple.
Go too far
Cause a ripple
******* me
Lose it

Just pass the time
With you

Sublime

The smell sets
into your skin
while waiting for the doctor
while waiting by the phone
while waiting for things
that don't happen anymore.
You try to scrub it off.
Instead,
you scrub off your skin
and find
the smell settled into your soul.
Now you are left skinless
asking
How do I scrub my soul?